As Gop And Dems Fail, Open Door For Alternative

December 14, 1994

During the 1932 presidential campaign, I covered a rally in Ohio where Norman Thomas, the Socialist Party candidate, was the speaker. In the question period, he was asked, "Do you really think a third party can win in America?" Thomas replied, "Your question is premature. First, we must build a second party."

Nothing better underscores his point than the strong bipartisan effort to blunt the GATT debate and ram the bill through Congress before opponenets could get their act together.

This time, the bipartisan juggernaut may have overdone it. Nonvoters and those who vote only for candidates they regard as least likely to give them the shaft now comprise more than two-thirds of the electorate. That leaves the status quo skating on pretty thin ice.

Goosed by GATT and other factors, the nation's work force might soon coalesce into a populist movement that would put both the elephant and the donkey on the list of endangered species.

This possibility is not farfetched. Ross Perot, running for president in 1992, got enough votes to light up the Richter scale; and it was only a dry run by a "reluctant" candidate who had pulled himself up on the backstretch.

Perhaps we should all thank our lucky stars that Huey Long is not around today to take advantage of the situation.